


there's only us, there's only this

by gealbhan



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Allusions to canon-typical violence, Angst, Backstory, Bittersweet Ending, Critical Role Femslash Week, F/F, Falling In Love, Language of Flowers, Marriage, Mild Character Injury, Pre-Canon, Secret Relationship, dramatic irony at its finest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-01-18
Packaged: 2019-10-09 17:10:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17410910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gealbhan/pseuds/gealbhan
Summary: Yasha regards love much the way people do natural disasters: with fear, inevitability, and distance. She could have never prepared for Zuala.





	there's only us, there's only this

**Author's Note:**

> written for day 3 of [critical role femslash week](https://critrolefemslash.tumblr.com/post/180178925470/critical-role-femslash-week-will-be-held-wednesday): moonlight!
> 
> title is from "another day" from _rent_ , because i kept talking about zuala's hair in the moonlight and it just... stuck. enjoy! :)

Yasha regards love much the way people do natural disasters: with fear, inevitability, and distance.

She has never been a soft, loving woman—she is given the name _Orphanmaker_ for a reason, and dull rage has rested in her bones, waiting to be released, since she was young. She wasn’t made to be delicate. Physically and mentally, she’s rough edges all the way around. She is okay with that. She wasn’t built for love, she knows, and she doesn’t expect to find it.

That’s the way things are. Bonds are lifelong, but they’re prearranged and for reasons of order and practicality rather than love. If things go right, they can turn that way (Yasha speaks with a number of happy couples, though they’re the minority), but if they don’t—

Well. There’s a reason Yasha has attended so many funerals and seen even more banishments in the years she’s been a member of the tribe.

She has grown to accept that, one day, she’ll be given a mate by Skyspear. One day, she’ll wed and hopefully learn how to get along or at least coexist with her mate. They will follow the rules. They will have a peaceful if not quite loving relationship.

This is Yasha’s future, bleak as it might have seemed to her younger self. She thinks of quiet, loveless nights with her future spouse, sharing a meal and not saying a single word, and she feels a numb sense of acceptance, even if it’s not what she might have dreamt of as a girl. She is okay with the path her life will take. She is prepared for it.

She could have never prepared for Zuala.

+

The first time she sees Zuala, Yasha is chopping wood.

It’s something she likes to do at night when she finds herself unable to sleep, which has been happening more and more as of late—at least four or five nights a week. So she comes out to this clearing, grabs an axe and a stack of wood, and chops. The tribe could always use more wood, so it serves a purpose, and the repetition calms her down. Even if the noise isn’t preferable.

She’s never done this with anyone’s company save for the moons, so Yasha is startled when another woman approaches her, skin glowing under the moonlight. Yasha recognizes this woman in the way one recognizes a dream. She’s only seen her in group settings before, and in those, Yasha tries to avoid anyone’s eyes lest she be dragged into a conversation she doesn’t want to be part of, so she doesn’t know the woman’s name nor her title. As far as Yasha knows, she’s a new addition to the tribe.

“Hey, Orphanmaker,” the woman greets, as though they are familiar.

Yasha sets her axe down. “Hello,” she says, soft and devoid of any emotion. She turns her head and meets the other woman’s steady dark eyes. “Who are you?”

“Zuala.” She sticks out her hand, which is visibly scarred and calloused. “And you are?”

“…Yasha.” It isn’t uncommon for people to not know each other’s real names, especially when they’re new to the tribe dynamics, so she brushes the question off. She still doesn’t take Zuala’s hand. “What do you want?”

Despite Yasha’s brusqueness, Zuala keeps smiling. It’s a bit eerie. “I only wanted to speak with you. I’d like to get to know the other members of the tribe—we’re family, right? So we should act like it, not like the weird repressed strangers we do.”

“Skyspear wouldn’t approve of you saying that, probably,” says Yasha, picking her axe back up.

“Perhaps not.” Zuala clasps her hands together at her waist, not seeming offended by Yasha’s refusal to shake her hand, then says baldly, “Maybe I don’t need Skyspear’s approval.”

That gives Yasha pause—she hesitates mid-swing, then lowers her axe to her side again. “Is that so?”

“I’d never say it to her face, of course,” says Zuala quickly, “but she’s a bit of a stickler, you know?”

Yasha opens and then shuts her mouth. Best not get into it.

“I respect Skyspear very much,” she says, giving Zuala a sharp side glance before she swings her axe and splits the wood before her in one fell swoop. “She is our leader, and I would lay down my life for hers without question. You will think that way too, before long.”

Zuala smiles, wry, and narrows her eyes. “I didn’t say I didn’t.”

“True.” Yasha drops her axe and rubs her now-aching arms. Powerful as she is, a few hard swings—as she’s been lapsing into since Zuala showed up—stil make her muscles cramp up. It’ll be worse in the morning, so all she can do for now is take a break.

“I have some cream that helps with muscle pain,” suggests Zuala. She glances at the horizon. “It’s getting late, but if you’d like me to come back tomorrow…”

“I—” Yasha’s mouth thins out. Zuala turns her head back toward her, blinking at whatever she sees in Yasha’s face. Not knowing why, Yasha hears herself say, “All right.”

Zuala’s expression lights up. “See you tomorrow, then, Yasha!” she says, patting Yasha’s shoulder before she skips off.

By the time Yasha processes what’s happened, the moons are lowering in the sky and Zuala is long gone. She rubs her eyes and gathers up her wood. It’s a long hike back to their village, so she might as well get started now.

It seems, however, that she’s made a friend.

+

After that, it becomes a routine: most nights, Zuala comes to watch Yasha chop wood (or not, some nights) and strikes up conversations. They talk about everything and nothing; about their deepest, darkest secrets one night, and the weather the next. Some nights, they don’t even do that. They just stand together and exist in each other’s orbits. Yasha is startled by how fast she takes to Zuala—to her wit, to that smile of hers that bears a hint of sharp teeth and dimples, to the way her hair glows in the moonlight.

“You have beautiful eyes,” says Zuala tonight, apropos of nothing.

Yasha almost drops her axe. She turns to look at Zuala, who’s leaning against a tree and holding a bright red flower in her hand. Yasha doesn’t know where it’s from—except for the trees, which are thinning out by the day, there’s no plant life nearby, and especially not that vivid.

“Thank you,” says Yasha. “Your flower is beautiful as well.”

Shit, she thinks, blushing up to her ears and twisting her head away from Zuala. She’d meant to say _eyes_.

“It’s a red campion,” says Zuala, voice delighted as though Yasha had complimented her eyes anyway. “It’s a symbol of encouragement.”

“Encouragement?”

“Yes! Like, you know, _I’d like to get to know you better_.”

Yasha swallows a laugh. “Are you hinting something?”

“Maybe,” says Zuala, and Yasha turns back to see her eyes twinkling. That’s a dangerous expression. “Wanna play a little game? We can go back and forth asking each other questions—like, one of us asks a question, we both answer it, then the other asks a question, and so on. We can stop after a bit, but—I don’t know. I think it’d be fun to learn more about each other, don’t you?”

Yasha glances at the sky. It’s still dark enough that it blots out any thought that there might have once been sunlight there, even with the blue-tinted light of the moons and stars, so time wouldn’t be a problem. The promise of information about Zuala is intriguing, too. Despite her curiosity, she doesn’t reveal much about herself unless directly asked, and Yasha doesn’t like to ask such blatant questions.

“All right,” she decides. Zuala’s grin widens, but she doesn’t say anything else, expectant gaze remaining on Yasha. Yasha clears her throat. “Okay, um, what’s your favorite…”

+

One night, Yasha is chopping wood with a longsword instead of an axe. It doesn’t give as clean a cut, but it’s a nicer fit, made for her grip, and she’s much more familiar with its weight. Axes are unbalanced and heavy in her hands; she’d been relieved when one of the other tribe members had asked to borrow hers today, leaving her with only her sword to cut wood with.

After they exchange their greetings, Zuala raises her eyebrows and says, “Could you shave people with that?”

Yasha frowns. “That is not really its purpose, but I guess so.”

“Could you do my bikini lines?”

Yasha’s face goes very hot very quickly as she tries not to think of Zuala wearing anything that would require that much of her hair, and her hair _in certain areas_ , to be shaved. She doesn’t slice into her hand, but it’s a damn close thing. When she looks up at Zuala, eyes narrowed, Zuala is smirking. Shit. Yasha swallows.

“In theory, sure,” she says, weighing her sword in her hand like she isn’t thinking of shaving around Zuala’s crotch with it. “But I’ve never done that. I—I will test it on my arms first, maybe. That seems less dangerous.”

“Cool. Tell me how it turns out,” says Zuala, and then she saunters away.

Yasha does, later, and it works as well as it can be expected to. She doesn’t mind her own body hair, nor anyone else’s, but it’s kind of nice to have smooth arms that she can just run her hands over every now and then and marvel at.

She doesn’t mention it to Zuala. Zuala doesn’t ask.

Yasha isn’t disappointed.

+

Night by night, over the period of weeks and then months, Yasha comes to realize how much she cares for Zuala.

First, it’s laughing at something Zuala says—a startled laugh, louder than she’d expected and louder than she’d laughed in a very long time. Later, she won’t even remember what Zuala said that coaxed it out of her. Just that Zuala had laughed too, and that it had been the best sound Yasha had ever heard.

Then Zuala is chattering on about the stars, which she says she’d learned the name of as a child, and Yasha is watching and listening and feeling her own gaze soften. She goes home with more knowledge of the stars and constellations than she’d ever thought she’d have, let alone enjoy having. The next night, she points out one of the stars Zuala had talked about. Zuala’s beam is enough for Yasha to smile.

And another night, she reaches for Zuala’s hand, and Zuala lets her hold it, holds hers back. Yasha can’t remember ever being that casually intimate with someone. _You_ held hands _,_ she tells herself on the walk back, her heart rushing in her ears and disbelief coloring her thoughts. _You didn’t kiss, or anything like that._

Oh, but how she wishes she had kissed Zuala.

That realization leads her to a whole new series of heart palpitations.

Yasha has not yet had been assigned a mate, which is fine by her; she’s chosen not to think of it as a punishment but a reward. There’s the chance that she could be paired with Zuala, of course, but Yasha doesn’t want to think about how slim that is. There are plenty of other eligible people for either to receive as a mate.

Within weeks, Yasha realizes how hard and fast she’s falling in love, and that she can’t do a thing about it. They can’t have each other, but they _don’t_ have each other, even if Yasha starts looking at Zuala like she might as well be the third moon in the night sky; even if she can tell that, sometimes, Zuala is looking back.

The world keeps turning. Conversation by conversation, Yasha falls deeper in love with someone who is not meant for her.

Conversation by conversation, someone falls in love back.

+

The first night they kiss is much like the first they’d shared together. The moons are shining in the middle of a clear sky, and Yasha is chopping wood with gritted teeth, dark circles under her eyes, and few words. They’re far more used to each other now than they had been that first night, slinging comments back and forth easily and without tension. Other than that, the only difference is that Zuala’s lounging against a tree instead of hovering beside Yasha. Yasha misses the distance.

“You know,” says Zuala after a period of comfortable silence, and Yasha hums in acknowledgment, “I was always kind of surprised by how nice you turned out to be. I mean, you were a little rude the first time we talked, but—” She shrugs. “I don’t know. I’d never seen you smile before. I watched you, a little,” she admits, and Yasha tilts her head up. “Not in a creepy way, or anything—you were just, you know, big.” Yasha could point out that Zuala is almost her size, both in height and muscle mass, but she doesn’t. “And stoic. But you’re not now.”

Yasha flushes. “Well, um. You bring something out in me, I suppose.”

Zuala laughs, delight clear in the sound. Yasha’s heart stutters. “Oh, do I?”

“I don’t know,” echoes Yasha.

“Are you saying I make you happy, Orphanmaker?” Zuala folds her arms, grinning and shaking her head. “That name especially makes you sound super scary—everyone else in the tribe except maybe Skyspear thinks that too. Don’t worry, I won’t tell them you love flowers and are the sweetest person alive.”

“Oh, be quiet,” murmurs Yasha, but she’s smiling.

Zuala smirks and says, “Make me.”

Yasha meets her eyes, which are unreadable from here but wider than they had been a moment ago. The tension lasts for about half a second. (Really, when one considers it, that tension has been ready to snap for months.) With pointed, precise movements, Yasha sets her axe down, crosses the clearing in a few short bounds, and takes Zuala’s face in her palms. Zuala’s eyes soften.

“Are you going to kiss me or not, Yasha?” she says, smug despite her widened eyes and pink-tinted face, warm and somehow minty breath washing across Yasha’s lips, and—

Yasha does.

(Later, she says, lips sore from both smiling and kissing, “I don’t love flowers, by the way.” At Zuala’s offended face, she adds, “I mean, they’re very pretty, but I just like them. I had—I’d never seen very many until I met you, you know?” She rubs her neck. “So I do kind of love them, but only because I—I associate them with you. And I love you.”

Not much more than two seconds pass before Zuala kisses her again.)

+

And so something begins.

It is a tentative thing, Yasha and Zuala’s relationship, though it grows more tangible and bolder as months pass without anyone catching on. Neither of them have received mates yet. Yasha sees it as more and more of a blessing day after day—if she were asked to part with Zuala now, she doesn’t think she could. She hopes she’ll never have to face that day.

They continue their secret nighttime meetings. In the day, they exchange pleasantries if they even come into contact with each other; in the night, now, there’s more kissing and exchanges of soft words and all of the other things Yasha had never thought she’d be able to experience.

One night, Yasha asks, “Did I dream you?”

She and Zuala are tangled up together on the ground, hands linked at their sides. (Zuala had asked if she wanted to fall asleep under the stars tonight. Yasha hadn’t answered until Zuala had promised she woke up early and that they’d have plenty of time to get back home; then, she’d agreed readily, and they’d both realized they didn’t have any bedrolls.)

She thinks it’ll go unnoticed, because they’re both so close to sleep already, but Zuala laughs. “If this is a dream, then it’s the damn finest one I’ve ever had,” she says.

Well, Yasha can’t disagree with that.

She shuts her eyes and tucks her head beneath Zuala’s chin.

+

One night, over half a year since Yasha and Zuala began their relationship, Zuala doesn’t show.

It throws Yasha for a loop—Zuala is always on time, with an accuracy that scares Yasha a little, and yet Yasha chops her way through an entire log without Zuala appearing. She isn’t here every night, but she always says when she doesn’t think she can get away. Last night, she’d just kissed Yasha with a tenderness that had made Yasha’s knees buckle and bid her goodbye.

What if something happened? What if she’s not okay? What if—

Yasha shakes her head, bites her lip, and finds another stack of wood so she doesn’t have to think.

When Zuala does emerge from the trees, stumbling through the dirt to where Yasha is standing, it’s over an hour over their regular time. Her face is stricken, and her eyes are puffy and red—overall, she looks harried and exhausted in a way that even Yasha can notice with a single glance. She storms forward, not looking Yasha in the eyes.

Something is wrong. Yasha’s stomach churns as she, silent, watches Zuala standing there with her arms crossed and shoulders hunched in. She gives a simple, short nod and looks away in favor of swinging down.

“I’ve been assigned a mate,” says Zuala, then, in lieu of a greeting.

Yasha swings her axe right into her thumb.

Pain swells through her hand as she swears, then puts pressure on the wound with her other hand and hopes it isn’t so deep a cut she’ll need actual medical attention. She turns to face Zuala, who’s sat down and is staring up at the sky. The space between them is palpable.

Yasha swallows, and she whispers, “Who?”

“Sunstalker.” Yasha’s expression must be pretty blank (and rightly so, she thinks, because she’s never heard this name), because Zuala adds, “She has the, uh, fire hair, and the little horns—I’m sure you’d recognize her if you saw her. I—I didn’t stick around long enough to learn her real name.”

“Oh,” says Yasha, and only that. She takes a careful step forward. “Are—do you—” Her mouth twists into a grim line, unable to spit out anything from the storm of sentence fragments floating around her brain.

Zuala lifts her head, face dripping with tears and forehead crinkled. Normally, Yasha would kiss that crinkle until Zuala giggled and it went away. Now—

“I can’t marry her,” whispers Zuala, her hand over her mouth. “I—I knew this would happen. I knew it probably wouldn’t be us, but I _hoped_ , Yasha—I hoped so much that I think I just about convinced myself we would be mates. It’s a dangerous thing to hope, Yasha.”

Yasha’s chest tightens. “I know,” she whispers back. “I’ve always known that. Can’t you—can’t we—” All of her half-thought suggestions die on her lips as her heart sinks into her stomach. She knows as well as anyone that Skyspear’s decisions are final—no exceptions, as some have learned the hard way. Whatever Skyspear says, especially in regards to the choice of mates, goes.

Zuala shakes her head. “There’s nothing we can do, darling,” she says, and then she stiffens. “Unless—”

“Unless?” prompts Yasha, stomach still in knots and heart beating so loudly that she thinks Zuala must be able to hear it too.

But Zuala shakes her head again, biting her lip and pulling her knees up to her chest. It breaks Yasha’s heart to see her—a confident woman who takes up space, loud and proud, and brightens up every space she’s in—diminished to this—a colorless, shaking figure, tucked in on herself.

She won’t have any of it, she decides, and she crouches beside Zuala. She reaches out to lay a hand on her knee, then thinks better of it. “Tell me,” she says softly. “There’s no harm in just saying it, is there?”

Zuala takes a deep breath. From the pinched look on her face, there might be some harm in saying it, but Yasha keeps her gaze steady, and after a moment, Zuala sighs. “Yasha,” she says, barely above a whisper, “will you marry me?”

Yasha freezes—that’s far from what she’d been expecting. Still, it’s a shot straight to her heart. She has time for a single shaky inhale before her eyes prickle and then, less than a second later, overflow with tears.

Zuala’s face falls. “Oh—I’m so sorry, that’s okay, I didn’t mean—I don’t—that was such a stupid idea anyway, I’m—”

“ _No,”_ says Yasha, wiping her tears with a hint of desperation. Her lips split into a smile, and she grasps Zuala’s hands and holds on for dear life, wrapping her calloused fingers in an almost-crushing grip. Zuala makes a small, confused sound. “I was just—I wasn’t expecting you to say that. Of course I want to get married, Zuala. I love you. I would—” She shakes her head and loosens her grip on Zuala’s hand. “I would love nothing more.”

“Oh,” says Zuala, breathless. “Really?”

“Really.”

Zuala smiles in return before kissing Yasha, who leans in without even thinking about it. Zuala is cold and tastes like salt—upon realizing that, Yasha frowns and sits back. She runs her hands across Zuala’s cheeks, which are filled with color and covered in silent ears that, Yasha is sure, match her own. Yasha wipes them and Zuala’s running makeup away with her thumbs. She starts to lean back in but stops just short.

“What will we do about—”

“We’ll figure it out, darling,” Zuala tells her. She burrows her head in Yasha’s shoulder, and Yasha can do nothing but wrap her arms around Zuala’s—her mate’s, by tribe law or not—back and cling to her. Zuala trembles against her, but she still whispers, “We’ll figure it out.”

They sit there, crying in each other’s arms, until the dawn breaks.

+

They don’t figure it out, not in so many words, but they do make plans. Over several nights of teary words, whispered beneath the treetops painted with moonlight, Yasha and Zuala decide on a night and a ceremony, and they shake hands before they part ways to sleep and make hurried preparations.

And, a month before Zuala’s scheduled marriage to Sunstalker, they get married the same way they had fallen in love—in the night, in private, the moons watching over their secret clearing. Yasha heads there past midnight and waits with her heart thudding out of her chest as she wrings her hands. Beside her, one of her swords—a longsword half the size of her body—leans against a tree stump.

She’s not had the time nor help for the elegant hairstyles brides wear in public ceremonies, but she has pulled her hair into two long braids and braided all the tiny blooms she could find into it. It’s the best she could do. She’s happy with it. Minus the flowers, she’d been wearing her hair like this when she’d met Zuala.

Yasha glances up toward the sky. She’s been waiting an odd twenty minutes, maybe—long enough for Zuala to have shown up.

Her stomach tightens. Yasha forces herself to take deep breaths, shutting her eyes and smoothing down her braids. Zuala is probably on her way right now. _It’ll be all right,_ Yasha tells herself despite the dread prickling at the back of her neck like icy rainwater running down her skin. _Everything will be all right._

A set of footsteps snap Yasha out of her quiet prayers. Her head whips up just as Zuala steps into the light, and Yasha sucks in a breath at the sight of her.

Zuala’s braided hair falls along her shoulders, the slick shine catching the moonlight in the way it always does—somehow, though, it seems more beautiful than ever now. She’s wearing a loose garment similar to a suit, but not quite, and a crown of flowers and straw. In one hand is a small sword. It’s not nearly as large as the one Yasha had brought, but it makes her gaze soften nonetheless. Zuala lifts her head and grins.

 _Oh,_ thinks Yasha, dazed, thinking back to all the detached wedding ceremonies she’s attended. The nerves in her stomach unwind. _This is what it’s supposed to be like._

“Hello, wife,” says Zuala, grin leaning on the side of lecherous.

Yasha ducks her head to hide her delighted smile. “Not yet, I’m not.”

“Ah, but you will be.” Zuala steps closer so Yasha can see the twinkle in her eyes. “Shall we begin, love?”

Yasha nods and takes Zuala’s hand. With her other arm, Zuala passes over the sword, tip facing the ground, and Yasha’s mouth parts when she notices the ring secured on its hilt. She won’t be able to wear it, at least not in public, but—

“It’s beautiful.” She takes the sword and smiles, deciding not to think of the fact that she hadn’t thought to bring a ring of her own. Where would she even have gotten one, though? she wonders. “I will have to—to make a necklace for it, or something of the sort.”

“I look forward to seeing that,” says Zuala, rubbing Yasha’s finger with her thumb. Then her face sobers, and she says, more solemn than usual, “This is my ancestors’ sword, passed down in my family for generations. Originally, it belonged to my great-something-grandfather. I’ve only ever used it for hunting.”

“What a waste,” jokes Yasha, examining the blade. It’s made of a solid, shiny material that’s rusting at the edges and that catches the moonlight like Zuala’s hair. Needless to say, Yasha’s heart swells at the sight.

She sheathes the sword at her side. It’s smaller than the usual swords she uses, so it slips around, but if she stands still, it’ll be fine.

“I will make good use of it, I promise,” she says, and she knows she will. “And for you—”

She leans down, dropping Zuala’s hand, and picks up her sword, settling it across both her hands. Zuala blinks.

“You’re giving me _that_ sword? It’s—Yash, love, that’s your favorite.”

“It’s an ancestral sword,” says Yasha with a little laugh, then she pauses. “I assume so, anyway, because it has been with me my whole life. Well, even if it isn’t, it’s—it’s important to me. As are you.”

A pause, then Zuala sniffles. “Don’t make me cry before we even bind our hands,” she says, reaching up to rub a little mistiness from her eyes.

“Of course.” Yasha adjusts the sword in her grip, planting it into the ground, and guides Zuala’s hand to rest atop its hilt. She settles her hand above Zuala’s. “Are you ready?”

Zuala nods. Yasha mimics it, then leans down and picks up the handcrafted cords she’d absently tossed onto the tree stump when she’d first arrived here.

“Just as a warning,” she says, quiet, “this is not going to go very well. Sorry.”

On the sword, their fingers intertwine. Yasha’s not sure whether it’s Zuala or her who does it. Zuala reaches across the distance to cup Yasha’s cheek, and Yasha leans into the touch, eyes fluttering shut.

“As long as it’s us,” says Zuala, “it’ll be perfect.”

Yasha takes that as an invitation to begin wrapping their hands. Because it’s not being performed by a third party, it’s a sloppy job—while Zuala tries to stand still and bites her cheek to avoid laughing (not that Yasha would blame her), Yasha winds the thread around her and Zuala’s hands and the sword’s hilt until it’s all been used. From the loose knots, a strand of ribbon dangles down, dark against the sword’s blade. Zuala’s hand is warm and a bit sweaty. Yasha can only imagine how clammy her own is.

She sucks in a breath. “Zuala,” she says, taking Zuala’s other hand and holding it with the utmost care, “I have never been in love before—no, I don’t think I have even loved anyone, romantically or not before.” She lets that sit between them as she inhales and exhales at a steady pace. “You—you took me by surprise. I never expected—I never thought—” She laughs, soft, and Zuala stares back at her. Yasha thinks she should be used to the way Zuala’s attention narrows in on her by now, after well over a year of knowing each other and months of _knowing_ each other, but it still makes her breath catch and stick in her throat. “You know I’m not too good with words, so… all I have to say, really, is that I love you and I pledge myself to you for life.”

She lowers her head, then lifts it back up when Zuala gasps and sniffles. Yasha’s brows furrow with concern, but—

“I didn’t—shit, Yasha, I didn’t prepare _any fucking vows_ ,” hisses Zuala, eyes big and face void of color.

Yasha can’t help herself. She bursts out laughing.

Zuala’s cheeks puff out the way they do when she’s both happy and upset—mostly at herself, Yasha knows, for not being able to laugh without losing her dignity. Yasha’s laughter rings through the clearing, unabashed and loud enough to interrupt the calm of the night. She’s too happy to care.

“You don’t have to say anything,” she tells Zuala once she’s recovered, shaking her head. “I—I just wanted to. Um. I can unwrap our hands, maybe, if you’d like?”

Zuala considers that. “No, it’s nice,” she says. “Maybe you could untie us from the sword, though? It’s—really cold.”

Yasha laughs again, the pit in her stomach replaced with a loose and light feeling. “Okay.”

She undoes only the knots connecting them to the sword, retying the cords around their hands when she needs to, and tightens her grip on Zuala’s hand. Zuala reaches back to tuck one of Yasha’s braids back, fingers feather-light and cool against her neck. Yasha shivers.

“I suppose this is the part where I kiss the bride, hm?”

“I suppose it is,” says Yasha, grinning, and she lets herself be dipped.

Their bodies collide like they have so often before. Zuala is as muscular as she, if not more so, so she’s able to lower Yasha without dropping her without so much as breaking a sweat. From a distance, they’d look as though they’d been dancing—their hands intertwined and wrapped in corded ribbons, Yasha’s arm thrown around Zuala’s neck as she leans up into her, Zuala’s arm around Yasha’s waist to support her weight. The air is stiff and crisp, and Yasha clutches at the back of Zuala’s head, and everything feels right.

They drift apart—then Zuala kisses her again, quick but gentle. Once they break apart this time, Yasha keeps her forehead pressed to Zuala and takes a deep breath before she opens her eyes.

Though it hasn’t been spoken, though technically this isn’t even legal within their tribe or the overarching law of their home, Yasha feels it in the gentle whisper of the wind through the clearing ( _their_ clearing): they’re married. A bond that will last a lifetime, if not more. There is no witness to their union but the moons and the trees and Yasha and Zuala themselves, and Yasha wouldn’t have it any other way. When she looks at Zuala, she knows in a heartbeat that she feels the same.

“Hey, wife,” says Zuala, eyes wet and smile wide. “For real this time.”

Yasha laughs. “Hi, Zuala,” she says, the happiness in every ounce of her being threatening to burst through her chest, “my darling wife.”

(She should have always known, she will think later, that it was never meant to last.)

**Author's Note:**

> some of the wedding details mentioned here (the exchanging of swords, the hairstyles, zuala's bridal crown, the handfasting) were inspired by historical viking/nordic wedding traditions! it was real fun researching that :') also, hopefully the other 2 fics i'm going to write over this weekend will be shorter... but knowing me i will not live up to that promise
> 
> anyway, thanks for reading!! if you have time to spare, i really appreciate all comments & kudos <33
> 
> [tumblr](http://dndbutch.tumblr.com) / [twitter](http://twitter.com/birdmarrow)


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